Scooter Libby

The type of generic Cheerios that I favor are called "Scooters." Is there such a thing as coincidence, or do we live in a holistic universe, where nothing is coincidental?

Bush recently commuted the 30-month prison sentence of convicted criminal and Vice Presidential aide Scooter Libby. Personally, I had never believed that Bush was going to allow one of his hatchet men to endure so much as a week behind bars, so count me among the many unsurprised observers. My guess will be that not only will Libby not serve a day in prison, he will also not have to pay his fine, and he might not even be disbarred in the end.

I think what went into the decision was partly a reward for service and loyalty, and partly an effort to undermine the ability of the prosecutor to exert pressure on Libby to secure testimony implicating people higher up. Bush's official rationalization (that Libby had been sentenced to an excessive prison term) is ludicrous. From start to finish the investigation and trial were conducted by Bush appointees, and the Bush "tough on crime" Justice Department routinely inflicts maximum punishment.

The New Times finds some spine.

This article doesn't go so far as to actually call the president a hypocrite, they leave that to the quoted experts. This is a tough article and I'm glad to see the paper of record hitting Bush on this issue.

The Times does skip over an issue that Glenn Greenwald over at Salon.com spends a lot of posts on, being the elitist Washington culture. Bush is arguing that the 30-month sentence was excessive, not because the sentence is always excessive for that crime, but because Scooter Libby was his Friend and a member of the president's Movement, so the rules don't apply to him in the same way that they applto a peasant like you or me.

Enter David Brooks with a stunningly awful column (Times Select only).

Scooter Libby is a plain, straight-dealing man, the only pure actor in the "farce" that is his prosecution, beset and victimized by an army of liberal media figures and overweening judges and prosecutors. Joe Wilson is a rotten bastard clawing for media attention, the outing of his wife was completely unimportant and certainly not a crime, the sentence was excessive, and not only were all the Liberal Media Figures totally overreacting with their anger, but it is so unreasonable to be angry about Libby's activities that even they weren't actually mad--they were cynically faking the whole thing!

Throw in a couple of pointless reference to the suffering of Scooter Libby's family (let's forget the original crime, which was an attempt to punish an administration opponent by ruining his wife's career) and to the Clinton episode (lying about a major felony != lying about a blowjob) and you've got a turgid piece of s**t column, one of the worst I've ever read--and I've seen a lot of stinkers. This column is so bad, so logically flawed, and so venomous that it makes me irritated in the same way as getting a parking ticket, that feeling of deep annoyance and irritation that I can feel in the back of my skull, something no columnist apart from Cal Thomas has been able to do.